More Educated = More Liberal?

[All Along The Watchtower]

Having said that, I feel the subject background does indeed matter, but I think the breakdown needs to go deeper. Within engineering, you should find left-leaning specialisations (IT, environmental technologies) as well more 'conservative' ones (civil engineering, vehicle building). Lawyers are, at least in Germany, pretty "green", but here again, specialisation may matter (e.g. family law vs. corporate law).
Economists - already back in the 1980s, when working at Shell Germany during semester holidays, I found quite a number of Greenpeace members among younger economists there. Polls among German top managers typically find the CDU at slightly below 50%, and some 12% support for the Greens. If you correct that for age (essentially, you hardly find Green voters that are older than 50, but a lot of older top managers), I tend to say that in Germany, economists overall are probably slightly leaning to the right, but only barely so. Sector splits should be quite pronounced here, with industry leaning rightwards, while services, including banking, are more liberal.
As for medicine - quite a number of doctors here are in 'alternative medicine', however, doctors (as many other free-lancers) are also traditional FDP clientele. No idea how that works out overall. I am, however, pretty sure that dentists are leaning to the right, as are pharmacists.

Re: medicine.....from what I can tell, in the U.S., primary care physicians and nurses are considerably more likely to be Democrats than specialists are  (though that probably depends on the specialty in question, too. )  

[All Along The Watchtower]

Areas with high rates of education have historically been associated not just with Liberalism but also urbanization, advanced industrial development, expanded international trade, and "modernization" (for better or worse, depending on who you ask). Liberalism has always had a fairly elitist flair to it, especially when it comes to education, "cosmopolitanism"/worldliness, and cultural sophistication, so it's not (or shouldn't be) much of a surprise when less educated, working-class people find Liberalism's advocates off-putting, at best.

[All Along The Watchtower]

Getting back on topic....

My impression is that the most liberal voters tend to be lower-income/economic status voters with high educational attainment. Conversely, the most conservative voters tend to be higher-income/economic status voters with lower educational attainment.

Of course, there are other factors at work here as well. The former group of voters trends younger, more urban, more racially and ethnically diverse, and less male than the latter group.

[All Along The Watchtower]

Interesting article from a conservative Republican academic (a rare breed, as he calls himself. )

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http://www.aaup.org/article/rethinking-plight-conservatives-higher-education#.U4TX2_ldWSo

[All Along The Watchtower]

Yes, but so does less educated.  Those with moderate levels of education are the most conservative.

The least-educated demographic are almost always poorer and less likely to be white than the general population, of course. So the least-educated voting overwhelmingly Democratic may not have much to do with their educational attainment.

[All Along The Watchtower]

Anecdotally, amongst my classmates in engineering as an undergrad there seemed to be a definitely correlation between political views and academia vs. industry upon graduation. I suspect political views are more correlated than markers of success like grades. I imagine internship experience probably leads students to be more likely to take industry jobs as well.

It makes sense. Conservatives do tend to be more vocational in their mindset, and like the article states, value marriage, family, and home ownership moreso and at a younger age than liberals do. I suspect that conservatives also tend to not see much value in going into student loan debt for even more advanced education, when they could be out in the workforce making money and getting experience. Trade-offs, all of it.

[All Along The Watchtower]

Libertarians.  Socially moderate/liberal and economically, moderate/conservative.

White collars still tend to favor the GOP though for tax reason and since their gross incomes are higher. 

It depends heavily on what white-collar workers one speaks of. Government employees may be more concerned with funding of their jobs than with the taxes that they pay.

Conversely, many "blue-collar" folks are  self-employed/independent contractors, and so the GOP appeals to them on that basis.